The Lightning Runner
by Maze runner forever
Summary: Percy Jackson gets sent to The Scorch as a punishment for not getting Zeus's master bolt to him on time.
1. Sent

Percy POV

I was running out of time. Zeus was expecting me to return his lightning bolt in less than ten minutes. I was at the bottom of the elevator in the Empire State Building, going up to the very top. The one hundredth floor. Olympus. The lightning bolt was weighing my back pack down. Man, that thing was heavy. The elevator went up, up, up until I couldn't see the ground of New York out the window. And then we were there. At Olympus. The door opened and we stepped out. Annabeth first, and me second.

"Percy, hurry!" she yelled.

"I am _trying_ to hurry. I don't want the Gods to fight either!" I yelled back. We ran through the windy streets and down back alleys, trying to find our way to the Gods's castle or whatever they called it. My watch read 11:56Four minutes left until deadline. And the big metal lightning bolt in my backpack wasn't helping my speed.

A couple more turns, and then there it was, high and mighty in the sky. I honestly don't know how I missed it before. We ran up the steps, (there was at least one hundred) pushed open the doors and burst into the room. But not before the clock read 12:00. It was midnight, and I was too late. Zeus came thundering up to me.

"Where's the bolt?" His voice echoed in the big hall. I pulled it out of my backpack with great effort. Zeus snatched it from my hand.

"Since you got the bolt to me so soon after the deadline, I will not wage war on all the Gods. But you yourself will be punished for giving it to me after the deadline." He said. And with that, he raised the lightning bolt over his head it came crashing down. I heard my father yell.

I expected to feel pain, but all I felt was heat. Heat so hot it would have burned my skin off my body if I hadn't been wearing my jacket and jeans. I opened my eyes which I had closed to prepare for the blow. I was in the middle of a desert. On my right side, there was a city. On my left side, there was nothing. But then there was something. A large group of people had appeared out of nowhere. And they were headed in my direction.


	2. Meeting Up

Minho POV

We got up through the trap door and into the blistering heat of the desert. i stared through the heat waves and saw nothing. No, wait! I saw a figure stumbling around. He wasn't that far off, either. But then he stopped, and fell to the ground. He didn't get back up. Once everybody was out in the desert, I called them tattention.

"Listen up, shuck faces! There's a shank out there that probably needs our help." I said. " I say we help him, and if he's another trial or one of those crazy slinthead cranks, we leave. Sound good?" The other Gladers nodded their approval. And so we head out toward the mystery shank, with the sheets over our heads. It takes about an hour to get there. When we did, we found him laying on the ground, breathing shallowly, but not moving. I started to walk over to him but a hand held me in place

"Be careful, Minho." Newt said. Then the hand let go and I kept going. The strange boy was on his back, his eyes sealed shut.

"Hello? Are you okay?" I asked. He didn't respond, so I slapped him. His head snapped to the side and stayed there, but his eyes didn't open. The wind started increasing in speed.

"Dude, are you in there?" as had to yell over the wind. I shook him. He didn't respond. The wind kept increasing, it ripped at my hair and my clothes.

"Wake up, shuck face!" I screamed.

"Minho! He's not going lot wake up!" Someone screamed from behind me. I ignored them. I shook him again. The wind kept getting stronger and stronger. I shook him once more. Then his eyes popped open. They were bright green and looked crazy.

"He's a crank!" I yelled as I hurried to get off of him. But I was too slow. He screamed the word 'lightning' as loud as he possibly could. Then a thousand volts of electricity made both our bodies convulse. And then we caught on fire. But Thomas and Newt were there, shoveling sand onto us while the other Gladers ran around crazily. They continued to do this until the flames went out for both of us. They dragged us all the way to the city, the bodies thrown around by the wind. Once we got to the city, the went into the nearest building and propped us up against the wall. I felt like I was looking at my reflection when I faced him. He was limp, in pain, and awake, his bright eyes blinking every few seconds.

"Who are you?" He asked.

"We're the Gladers. I'm Newt, this is Thomas, this is Minho, and these are all our friends. Now who exactly might you be?" Newt asked.

"I'm Percy Jackson." The boy answered.


	3. Jorge

Percy POV

"What kind of name is Percy?" The Asian boy, Minho, asked.

"What kind of name is Minho?" I countered. He smirked.

"A cool name." He said. The boy with the messy brown hair, Thomas, was staring at us. He seemed like the calmest, most approachable one out of the three boys who introduced themselves. There was Minho, Thomas, and Newt. I painfully turned to Thomas.

"Do you people have a leader? Who's the leader here?" I asked him. He smirked.

"The one with the 'cool name'." He said pointing to Minho. "You seem pretty chipper for just being struck by lightning." He continued. I just realized that Minho looked much more beat up than I felt. He was also groaning. I don't know how I didn't notice that before. That somehow reminded me that being here was my punishment. I already missed Annabeth and Grover. Newt was staring at me.

"You sure don't seem like a crazy person. Are you a crank? Are you just not fully gone yet? Or was WICKED wrong about cranks?" He seemed to be talking to me, but I got the feeling that he was just talking to himself.

"I honestly have no clue what you're talking about. What's a crank?" I said to him. Before he could respond, a man jumped down from a whole in the ceiling. All the 'Gladers' turned in his direction.

"My name is Jorge. I am the king of this place. you intruded on my property." The man said. "Also, I'm a crank." At this, all the Gladers gasped. Thomas and Newt scooted against the wall. A bunch of other people jumped down from the hole in the ceiling. They all looked half crazy. Or more than half. Plus, all of them carried weapons. One man was carrying a screwdriver with what I assumed was blood on the tip. Another was carrying a shovel with a jagged edge. And yet another girl was carrying a small knife that had a red stain on the sharp side. It ended up that Newt Didn't need to explain. Cranks were crazy. Insane.

Jorge came over to Minho and me and stopped five feet in front of us. I couldn't run away or even or block myself if he tried to hurt me. I couldn't move at all actually.

_Are you happy, Zeus?_ I thought. It was him that gave me this punishment, but this was actually the Gladers's world. My punishment was someone else's reality. And it was a reality filled with cranks. I shuddered.

Jorge brought his foot back and kicked Minho in the shin. Hard. Minho screamed in pain.

"Say your sorry!" The crank yelled. I must have missed something when I zoned out.

"I'll be nice and give to the count of ten." Jorge said. then he started counting.

"One."

Thomas looked at Minho with look that said 'do it' all over.

"Two."

Minho didn't even look in Thomas's direction.

"Three."

Minho stared up at Jorge.

" Four."

Thomas said it aloud.

"Five."

Minho stared at Jorge.

"Six."

Minho stared.

"Seven."

"I'm sorry." Minho said.

"I don't think you meant that." Jorge kicked Minho again. Minho screamed again. "Say it with meaning, Hermano."

"Eight."

Minho glared.

"Nine."

"I'm sorry!" Minho said with fake feeling.

Jorge smiled to himself. He seemed pleased that he had gotten to kick Minho and still get him to say sorry. But I saw some disappointment in his eyes along with crazed pleasure. It was almost as if he had wanted to kill Minho, or what ever he was going to do if Minho didn't say sorry in time. But as soon as he turned his back, Minho leaped to his feet and tackled the crank 'king'. Jorge shrieked as he fell to the ground with Minho on top of him. And Minho punched him hard in the face. Over and over again. I thought it was rather amusing that he could get struck by lightning and still beat someone up, but the look on the other Gladers's faces was a mix of terror and dread. Thomas and Newt snapped out of their shock first and ran over to Minho and puled him off of Jorge. Minho didn't struggle, but he was smiling slightly. Jorge got to his feet and wiped a trail of blood from his mouth. I then saw why the Gladers were terrified. The look in his eyes had gone from slightly crazy to downright insane with loathing for Minho.

"You made me look weak in front of my people. That will not go unpunished." Jorge spat at him. "I will kill you myself tomorrow morning." All of the cranks behind him cheered, except for one. The girl with the small knife. Thomas jumped up.

"Can I talk to you please, in private?" he asked. So maybe he wasn't the most intelligent.

"Why would I do that? Or do you have a death wish, too?" Jorge laughed.

"Because I might have information you need." Jorge looked skeptical. "Please? Just ten minutes."

Jorge finally nodded. "Okay, but just ten minutes."

Then Jorge led him down a hallway and away from anyone who could help him in time. Ten minutes went by with the Gladers and me staring at the blood thirsty Cranks. Then they both came back, Thomas not looking harmed in the slightest. His shoulders even seemed more relaxed than before. Jorge turned to the Cranks.

"I have decided not to kill the boy who attacked me. But, since he punched me with both hands, I will cut one finger off each hand." This didn't get any cheers, but a few pleasured grumbles and happy laughs. I heard Thomas and Minho whispering to each other beside me. I only caught snippets of their conversation.

"What the-"

"I tried to-"

"-sure."

" I couldn't-"

"-why not?"

I stopped trying to listen.

"I'm going to take these people to go get food and I'm taking Brenda with me." Jorge announced. I sincerely hoped that Brenda was the girl with the knife. She didn't look that enthusiastic about killing Minho and also didn't seem all that crazy. The girl with the knife stepped and shoved her knife in her pocket.

Theses people were insane.


	4. Tunnels

That Percy shank was staring at the girl with brown hair and the knife. Brenda, Jorge had called her. She stopped in front of me and stared. I stared back. She sure didn't look insane. Maybe she just wasn't fully Gone then. I shrugged. It didn't matter right then. All that mattered was getting out of this crazy city alive. And making it to the Safe Haven. Whatever that was.

"Let's go." Jorge said. Newt helped me stand up. I put my arm out to Percy, but he shook his head and got up on his own. I was surprised that he could. Brenda was getting awfully close to Thomas. I didn't like the fact that her knife was very reachable from her back pocket. I walked with Newt, and Percy walked a few feet behind us. I still didn't fully trust him, so I kept looking back to see what he was doing. It was mostly just staring down at his feet and looking off to the side.

We followed Jorge down some steps into an underground tunnel system. Brenda and Jorge went into a supplies closet off to the side and the rest of us slumped against the walls. Percy and Thomas sat by themselves, both staring at their feet. Brenda came out and gave something brown and weird looking out of a can to Thomas and stayed to sit by him. He didn't move away. Jorge came out and served the same weird brown stuff to the rest of us. Newt didn't seem hesitant at all to eat it and when he didn't choke to death, I scooped some into my mouth. It actually didn't taste half bad. I ate more. Then the rumbling started. It started out small, then soon the whole building was shaking.

"Run!" Jorge yelled to everyone. I ran after him and so did most everyone else. Except Thomas. I saw Brenda pulling him the other direction of all of us. But before I could do anything, the ceiling collapsed in front of me, blocking me off from them. I had no choice but to follow Jorge, king of the crazies, down a dark tunnel with no flashlight. Not the best option.

As we ran, the ceiling collapsed behind us. Luckily, I was a runner. But Newt couldn't run. I was worried about him. So, I grabbed his arm pulled him on behind me. It was faster than he usually would have run, but I didn't particularly care. Finally, we got to a point where the ceiling stopped following us.

"Okay! Is everyone here?" Jorge called down the tunnel.

"Brenda and Thomas took the other tunnel, in the opposite direction." I informed him.

"What?! Brenda took the other route?! That's the longer, harder way! And there's more Gone Cranks that way!  
" Jorge sounded concerned for Brenda. At least he still had compassion. That was a good thing.

"We'll just have to go on without them." Jorge said. I wondered _where _we were going to go without them. But I still walked on with the rest of the group. Newt was huffing and puffing on my left.

"You okay, shuck face?" I asked him.

"Yeah, I'm fine." He wheezed. I took one last look at him then walked forward, right into Percy. He turned around in surprise. He gave me a closed mouth smile, then turned back to face the front.

"Hey, Percy." I said. "Are you a Crank or not?"

He looked at me like I was the crazy one. "I'm not completely insane! How you could even compare me to these wackos, I don't know. But my friends-" At this his face fell. He turned bright red and frowned, then turned back around.

_Wh__at's up with him? _I wondered. We walked down tunnel after tunnel, hour after hour, turn after turn. It got confusing and boring after a while. I was just afraid that Jorge was trying to get us lost, then attack with all of his Crank buddies. But then there was a staircase, leading up into the light of day. The light was blinding after hours of darkness, but I went toward it because I knew one thing for sure.

It was a way out.


End file.
